by Joseph Souza
The repetitive sounds of gunshots filled the air as each member of the herd got put down. Dar placed her hands over her ears and started to hum. I needed to get her out of here as soon as possible before she suffered a nervous breakdown. Her mental state was fragile, and I worried that she might be reaching her breaking point. She was a sensitive girl, her feelings crushed by the smallest of insults.
She’d once brought a wounded bird into the house and tended to it until it had healed, and she frequently captured insects in mason jars so that she could free them outside. Even her militant vegetarianism stemmed from her love of animals rather than any dietary reasons, despite her insistence that she loathed the taste of meat.
Once the gunshots stopped, an eerie quiet filled the house. Dar and I gathered our bags and headed downstairs. We stepped inside the dining room to say our goodbyes. Susan sat in one of the chairs, sobbing quietly. Rick knelt next to her, attending to her injured hand. He dabbed ointment on it and massaged it into the cut, before wrapping it in gauze.
“What happened?” I asked.
“I was saying goodbye to Lucy when she bit my hand. That’s never happened before. Lucy would never bite me.”
“None of them would. The cows were agitated and aggressive, classic symptoms of mad cow disease. I didn’t have the luxury of taking them out of the barn one by one. It had to be done as quickly as possible.”
“Lucy never would have bit me. Her head was not in the right place.”
“I told you not to name the animals,” Rick snapped.
“Sorry if I happen to get attached.”
“You’re still convinced that it’s a cow virus at work?” I asked.
“Has to be, though for the life of me I can’t figure out how. A virus like that gets into the animal, and it causes them to go haywire and do things they would never otherwise do. Same with people. Turns their brains into Swiss cheese. It explains why they were acting so crazy last night.”
After taping his wife’s hand, Rick sat in a chair and put his hands up behind his head. Susan stared down at the floor, her body shaking visibly.
“Now that the livestock are gone, what will you do?”
“The herd is insured, which should cover a portion of the loss. Susan and I will need to completely sterilize everything in the barn before we reinvest in more livestock. Viruses like this usually burn out in less than a month, which means we’ll have to wait and see what happens. We’ll probably wait until spring arrives before we buy another cow and start over. We still have our crops, and those won’t be affected by the situation. Guess we’ll just have to be vegetarians like you guys for the time being.” He smiled.
I picked up our suitcases and prepared to head for the door.
“Sorry that your visit came under such difficult circumstances. Maybe we can do this some other time.”
“Yeah, bro, some other time.”
“You have to realize that these things happen in nature, and especially on farms. Unfortunately, you guys picked the wrong time to come up to Maine.”
“All the same, I think I’ll keep my day job.”
“Living off the land is not for the meek. Better off sticking with your novels, Thom. Keep your hands out of the shit and on your keyboard,” Rick said, holding out his hand. “The offer still stands. Things ever get bad down in the city, you and the family are always welcome to stay here. Hell, even if things don’t get bad.”
“Thanks, Rick, but I seriously doubt that the world will ever get as depraved as you seem to think.”
“Hopefully not, but the offer still stands.”
“Duly noted.”
“Later, Aunt Susan,” Dar said, waving goodbye.
“Bye, Dar. Thanks for coming up, babe. I love you.”
“Luv you too, Aunt Suze.”
I went over and shook my brother’s hand, then gave Susan a kiss on her cheek and wished her a speedy recovery. Dar did not budge, instead waving goodbye from the door’s threshold. I picked up our bags and walked over to the door.
An odd movement in my peripheral vision caught my attention, and I turned to look. A lone chicken stood pecking frantically against the ground. I stopped to watch it. On closer observation, I noticed that it wasn’t pecking grain or kernels of corn. Something beneath it was…moving, struggling to free itself. Dar ran over and kicked the chicken, and it skittered off down the driveway, clucking, feathers swirling in the air. A tiny chick flapped its wings and tried in vain to stand, now pecked to a bloody pulp.
“Leave it, Dar, Rick or Susan will take care of it. Come on, let’s get out of here.”
“Damn!”
Off in the distance, I could see the hills shaded in a reddish-gray mist. The rolling green meadow where my brother’s cows grazed also had a brown tinge to it. As I stood there, out of nowhere three dogs sauntered towards us, their ears pinned back on their heads, and their backs hunched in a threatening manner. They moved with such a determined gait that I knew instantly we were in trouble. We had two choices: either sprint towards the car or retreat back to the safety of the house. Dar was maybe five feet behind me. If the pack made a break, they would certainly reach us. I stopped and began to retrace my steps, and was startled to see that one of the dogs coming towards us was Buster, Susan’s friendly golden retriever. What had gotten into him? He would sooner lick us to death than attack.
I instructed Dar to walk slowly back to the house and not make any sudden moves. We needed to remain calm so as not to alarm the dogs. As we continued our slow retreat, I kept my gaze locked on the pack’s eyes. They seemed fitful and tense, ready to charge at any moment. To my right, the injured chick struggled to rise to its feet, but I could see that it was too weak and injured to survive.
Just then the pack broke. Their savage barks filled the air, and they sprayed saliva and drool in all directions. We dropped our suitcases, and I shouted for Dar to head back to the house. I turned and grabbed her arm to pull her along with me. Dar tripped ten feet from the screen door. When I looked back, I noticed that a mangy mutt had bolted ahead of the pack and was closing in on us. I lifted Dar up, placed my arm around her shoulder, and helped her to the door. The approaching dog’s growls signaled that he was not far behind us.
I reached the door handle and twisted, shoving Dar inside, then turned and kicked the mutt in the head just as it leapt up towards my throat. It fell back against the ground and whimpered, though the kick did not deter it. It stood back up and made another mad charge. I slipped inside the door at the last second and secured the lock. The beast jumped up against the storm door and bared its fangs. A streak of bloody saliva dribbled down the pane of glass. The dog’s eyes gleamed in the light and appeared as a demon sent from beyond. Its fur was matted with blood, dirt, and caked mud. I slammed shut the main door and retreated back into the dining room, wondering why my brother had not come out with his gun and shot them all dead.
I searched, but he was nowhere to be found. Dar sat in a fetal position on the floor, staring off into space. I took her to the living room and laid her down on the couch. Her eyes didn’t waver but stared straight ahead as if in a daze. I threw a blanket over her shivering body. She didn’t complain or say a word, instead pulling the blanket up to her chin.
I ran upstairs, searching every room until I found Rick in the main bedroom on his knees and hunched over Susan’s prostrate body. Her face looked pale and her lips bloodless and dry. Sweat poured off her scalp and down her forehead. Rick tore the blanket off her body and threw it aside.
“What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know.” He swiped a wet cloth over her head. “I thought you two were heading back?”
“Something came up. Is Susan okay?”
“I’m worried, Thom. As soon as you two left, she collapsed and started to go into convulsions. She’s come down with a fever. If it gets any higher, I’m going to have to run her an ice bath.” He turned around and faced me. “Why in the world did you come back here?”
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��Something strange is happening out there, Rick. We nearly got ripped apart by a pack of dogs as we walked out to the car. We had to sprint back inside the house. And you’re not going to believe this, but one of those dogs was Buster.”
“Buster? No way! He’d never attack anyone like that.”
“I’m here to tell you he did.”
“Poor guy is scared of his own shadow. At the sound of thunder, he’s shivering under the bed like a coward.”
“Something got into him, Rick. There were two other dogs with him, and they all appeared rabid. In fact, if you haven’t noticed, all the animals around here are acting strange.”
“Maybe this mad cow virus is jumping ship.”
“I don’t care what’s causing this or why it’s happening. I’m worried about our safety right now, especially Dar’s. She’s on the couch downstairs in a state of shock.”
“I’m sorry to hear that, Thom, but right now I have to deal with Susan.”
“Maybe you should take Susan to the hospital.”
“Hospital? Are you kidding me? The nearest emergency room is almost an hour away, and if her temperature gets any higher while we’re on the road, I’ll have no way to control it.”
Susan closed her eyes and seemed to fall into a deep sleep. Rick put the back of his hand on her forehead and looked back up at me with worried concern.
“She’s sleeping now. I gave her some anti-viral medicine and a handful of Tylenols to help reduce the fever. Hopefully with a little rest, she’ll come out of it.”
“When you talked about this virus jumping ship, Rick, were you implying that humans are susceptible as well?”
“It’s highly unlikely, but theoretically, the virus could have been transmitted to Susan. Fortunately, many of these viruses aren’t lethal to humans. Makes us sick as hell, shit our brains out, but isn’t typically fatal. Of course, there are some viruses that are lethal, but I doubt this one has that potential.”
“What about AIDs? Wasn’t that transmitted from bats? And didn’t that Ebola outbreak a few years back make the leap from monkeys to humans?”
Rick stared at me with a grim expression before walking out of the room. I followed closely behind, feeling ashamed for bringing up such a grim subject with his wife so ill in the other room.
“Those are extremely rare examples, Thom. No offense, but we both know who the expert is on these matters. Now let’s give Susan some rest.”
I felt terrible for bringing this subject up, but I was thinking about Dar, my wife and Stephen back home. The situation up here frightened me, and I wondered if people around town had been experiencing the same phenomenon? The planet was in terrible shape and getting worse by the day, and I wondered whether these events were in any way connected.
“Rick,” I said, following him down the stairs, “is there any way we can find out if this situation is isolated, or if it’s happening elsewhere?”
“Thom, we moved up here to escape the modern world.” Rick sat down at the dining room table and poured himself a cup of coffee. “We don’t own a TV or radio. I’m thoroughly convinced that all that technological bullshit is what helped ruin our society.”
“You don’t really believe that?”
“Look around the place. See any of those things here?”
“So you live like a peasant. Good for you, Rick, but how else are we going to learn what is happening out there?”
“Susan and I usually get our news when we visit the local store to pick up groceries. Once a month, we drive down to Bangor and pick up a load of books and some trade magazines, maybe a few newspapers. The only subject I keep up on these days is genetics.”
I went into the living room to check on Dar and found her asleep on the couch. She was snoring and had her head on her hands. I placed the back of my fingers on her forehead and to my relief found her temperature normal. I returned to the dining room, plunked myself in the chair across from Rick, and poured myself a cup of coffee.
“So what do we do now?” I asked. “I’m not going to leave now that Susan is ill.”
“I appreciate that, but all we can do now is sit and wait, and see what develops. I’m sure this whole matter will blow over in a couple of days.”
“A couple of days?” I complained. “My wife and son are down in Boston expecting us to arrive home tomorrow, and now I can’t even get a hold of them because there’s no signal up here and you guys don’t own a phone or a computer. So no, Rick, I don’t have a couple of days to bale hay or shovel cow shit, or whatever it is you do up here.”
“I’ll forget I heard that,” he said, pouring more coffee. “What do you want me to do? You think I like what’s going on?”
“Just tell me how I can get in touch with my wife?”
“Look, I can lend you one of my rifles, and you can drive ten miles down the road to the general store. They have a pay phone there, and you can call your wife and tell her you’ll be a little late. Make something up if you have to, so she won’t be worried. Christ, you’re a writer, Thom. It’s not like you have to punch a clock first thing in the morning.”
Rick went into the other room, returning with a rifle clutched in his hands. He checked it once to make sure it was loaded and then placed it down on the wooden table in front of me.
“Here, this baby will take out anything that gets in your way. Stop an elephant in its tracks.”
I took the rifle off the table and held it. “I’m just warning you, if Buster comes after me again, I’m going to blow his ass straight into Canada.”
“If Buster’s as deranged as you say he is, then I suppose you’ll be doing the poor guy a favor.”
“Do you need any supplies while I’m there?”
“Got enough food and medical supplies to last a few years. But feel free to get yourself whatever you need.”
“Keep an eye on Dar for me while I’m gone.”
“Don’t worry, Thom, I’ll keep a good eye on both of those girls. They’re in good hands.”
I turned and headed toward the door, fully prepared to blow away anything in my path.
Chapter 4
AS SOON AS I OPENED THE door, I saw the pack of dogs milling around my car and waiting for me to exit. I pulled the handle open, and they sprang to life, sprinting over and barking maniacally. They ran up to the storm door and tried to paw it open, gnawing at the glass with their bared, bloody fangs. Rick ran over and slammed the main door shut, which caused the dogs to back away and stare at us with bloodlust in their eyes.
“Jesus, what the hell is going on with those goddamn dogs?” He peered at them through the window, shaking his head. “You were right, Thom. That’s Buster all right. Poor guy must have caught rabies from one of those other mutts.”
“I told you I wasn’t crazy.”
“There’s a pack of them that runs around the area. Never attacked anyone, but they must be getting more aggressive now that they’ve gotten sick.”
“They’re not going to leave us alone, Rick. Our only choice is to kill them or wait for them to leave.”
“Hand me that rifle.”
I passed him the weapon, happy to let him do the killing. I’d shot with him a number of times, but I’d never actually killed anything. I followed him to the back of the house. Once there, I gazed out the large bay window. The dogs milled around, following us, waiting for us to exit. I scanned the pasture and the hills and saw thousands of birds circling in the sky. They flew in strange formations, constantly switching directions and taking on new shapes. When the sunlight hit their feathers at a particular angle, it created a strange visual effect. It almost appeared as if they were trying to communicate something to us.
Rick opened a side window and stuck the barrel out. As soon as the dogs heard the screen go up, they lifted their heads and charged. Just as they came forward, we heard a noise coming from the barn. It sounded like the cows were acting up again. But that was impossible. Rick had fired a single round into every one of their skulls.
/> “What in the world is that?” he asked.
“Watch out, Rick! Those dogs are coming for us.”
I barely had enough time to finish my sentence when the mangy dog jumped up first. Rick waited a beat and then fired a single shot. The dog instantly fell back against the dirt, a bullet placed squarely above its left eye. Blood and gray pus oozed out of the wound. The black lab followed in the rear. Rick hesitated momentarily and then shot it as well, and it fell dead next to the first dog. He waited for Buster to arrive, cussing angrily as his old pal neared. It must have been hard for Rick to shoot his former best friend. He’d raised Buster from a pup and had nurtured him for the last seven years. “Sorry about this, buddy,” he said, waiting a second too long and allowing Buster the opportunity to jump up and grab the barrel in his teeth. Rick wrestled back control of the gun. The dog recovered and then leapt up at the window, its long nails scratching wildly against the siding. Rick stepped back inside the house, aimed the rifle downward from a standing position, and fired a single round into Buster’s head. The dog flew back and landed with a thump on the dirt. Tears welled up in Rick’s eyes as he surveyed his old friend. He wiped his moist eyes with the back of his hand and leaned out the window to observe his dead dog.
“Rest in peace, pal.”
“Rick, do you hear that noise? It’s coming from the barn.”
“I hear it, but I can’t believe it. I put down that entire herd one by one.” He started towards the back door.
“Obviously not.”
“How could that be? I shot them all in the head.”
“Could you have missed?”
“Missed? With a Glock from two feet? Hell no, Thom. I’m an expert shot. Dammit, I was standing point-blank in front of them when I pulled the trigger.”
“Then there has to be a reasonable explanation.”
